First, I've been told, by someone that taught middle school, that whoever
said "there is no such thing as a stupid question" never taught middle
school... :-)

Second, I should confess up front that I don't fly or know that much about
gliders.

But... I was doing some virtual tire kicking over on the wingsandwheels.com
want ads and looking at a picture of a Grob 103 twin 3 Acro - thinking that
looks like it could be fun - and it hit me - this thing has three wheels.
Now, I've seen other gliders with the same arangement before, but this time
it just struck me as odd.

As I understand it, the "traditional" arangement is one main wheel near the
CG plus one tail wheel. The idea being that one wheel has half the weight
and half the drag drag compared to the two main wheels found on the typical
powered airplane - right?

But on the Grob, I see three, count-em, three wheels. Same number as the
Cessna 120 I learned to fly in oh so many years ago. But! Instead of putting
two wheels side by side so the airplane can stand up by itself (avoiding
need for wing runners, wheels strapped to the wing to move it from place to
place, and whatever else comes from having the wheel in the middle) this has
all three wheels in a row. Seems to me that this arrangement has all the
disadvantages (weight and drag) but none the advangages (able to stand up
unaided) of having all those wheels.

What's up with that?

--
Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe
The Sea Hawk At WowWay D0t Com